What to Know
- An NYC Parks seasonal worker is among the two men charged in connection to separate fatal shootings that occured mere minutes apart and left three men dead, of which at least two were believed to have been migrants, according to police.
- The first of what police believe were two shootings happened around 10:45 p.m. July 21 near the corner of Flushing Avenue and Steuben Street in Clinton Hill.
An NYC Parks seasonal worker is among the two men charged in connection to separate fatal shootings that occured mere minutes apart and left three men dead, of which at least two were believed to have been migrants, according to police.
The first of what police believe were two shootings happened around 10:45 p.m. July 21 near the corner of Flushing Avenue and Steuben Street in Clinton Hill.
Police responded to a park and found a man shot in the chest. The man, 30-year-old Arturo Jose Rodriguez-Marcano, was rushed to a nearby hospital but did not survive his injuries.
Only minutes later, according to police, there was another shooting outside a migrant shelter along Ryerson Street near Flushing Avenue.
Two men were found shot at this second scene: 21-year-old Enny DeJesus Urbina Mendez and a 59-year-old man, who was later identified as Francisco Fuentes Rangel.
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Police said Urbina Mendez was struck by multiple gunshots and did not survive. Rangel was taken to the hospital in critical condition, but later succumbed to his injuries.
News
Urbina Mendez appears to have come to the U.S. in March 2024.
The migrant shelter was opened in April and is set up to house more than 700 single men.
A witness at the scene told NBC New York that he saw a couple of men riding a motorcycle coming down the street, heard gunfire, then saw one of the victims lying on the ground.
“My office is working with the New York City Police Department and local elected officials to get information about these shootings and inform the community," said New York State Attorney General Letitia James previously in regards to the shootings.
Twenty-six-year-old Jorge Said Benitez Villa was arrested and charged on July 24 with two counts of murder in the second degree, police said.
Subsequently, on Monday, 23-year-old Elijah Mitchell, a seasonal NYC Parks worker from Queens, was arrested and charged with murder in the second degree, criminal possession of a weapon in the second degree, and reckless endangerment in the first degree.
Additional details were not immediately available.
Attorney information for Villa and Mitchell was not immediately known.
